Tripwire happily goes off on a phone-cam toting Death Cab For Cutie fan who took a video of himself crashing the stage during a live show, and while it is pretty damned funny, Tripwire’s indignation might be a little misguided. From the sounds of this Philadelphia Daily News piece, it sounds like it’s the contribution to the band’s Directions DVD for “Talking Like Turnstiles”. Which makes sense, because it seems just a little too staged to be real – the fact that the security guard didn’t break the guys face into many little pieces is the first hint. The band is premiering a new cut from Directions on their website every week, but I’ve no idea if this one has officially aired yet. And as a postscript, Drowned In Sound has an interview with the band.

In more conventional video news, The Radio Dept have completed a video for their recent “The Worst Taste In Music” single. The new album, Pet Grief, is out next week.

Video: The Radio Dept – “The Worst Taste In Music” (ASF)

Head Full Of Wishes has the first of a series of interviews with the former members of Luna about the forthcoming documentary Tell Me Do You Miss Me, starting with bassist Britta Phillips. Andy also has a look at the artwork for the DVD of the doc, due out in June.

The AV Club talks to Emily Haines of Metric.

The Winnipeg Sun discusses bluegrass with Sarah Harmer in the context of her current album, I’m A Mountain.

One of the nice things about The Big Takeover’s expanded online format is that you don’t have to wait six months for new content in the print edition. Case in point – their two part interview with Stevie Jackson of Belle & Sebastian, already up for all to see.

My Morning Jacket talks to Pitchfork about southern rock and Z a year later.

PopMatters talks to Mark Kozelek.

The Subways will be back at The Guvernment on May 16. Ironically, this is a venue that is not accessible by subway.

No Yeti Dance has MP3s of Voxtrot’s recent radio set for KEXP. They’re in town with Irving at Sneaky Dee’s next Thursday. What better way to ring in the Easter weekend? Via Brooklynvegan.

The Pitch celebrates Centro-Matic.

Newsday and Philly.com profile Neko Case.

np – Centro-Matic / Fort Recovery

The first thing that occurred to me when I stepped in the Horseshoe tonight was, “Shit, I forgot my earplugs”. Because I did. And since Scotland’s Franz Ferdinand aren’t really known for their gentle acoustic lullabies, it was off to the washroom to snag some toilet paper to cram in my ears. That stuff actually works pretty well, to be honest. I was also sorry that the Leafs game didn’t make it into overtime, because that would have allowed me to miss more of Anagram’s set. I’d seen them before so I pretty much knew what to expect, but the big Scotsman behind me put it best: “Please stop. For the love of God, stop”. Nuff said.

The hype around Franz Ferdinand is pretty big right now, but to call them this year’s Strokes is unfair and inaccurate. One, they sound nothing like The Strokes – instead of ripping off 70s NYC punk bands, they crib from a lot of 80s NYC post-punk bands. I was hearing Talking Heads and Blondie, as well as some Gang Of Four. Secondly, I don’t think they’ve got the same commercial potential as The Strokes. Note that this is no comment on their music, as I don’t really like The Strokes, but FF are considerably less accessible. Jagged guitars, four-on-the-floor disco drums-and-bass, jerky vocals with the right balance of tunefulness and abrasion don’t go down too easy with the suburban kids. And no bridges stolen from Tom Petty. That certainly doesn’t mean that they can’t kick some ass amongst the indie kids, though. The ‘Shoe was sold out and packed with hipsters and the curious but the crowd was surprisingly restrained. There was some dancing and enthusiastic applause, but I didn’t get the feeling that people were having their worlds spun around. Could be because with these buzz bands, the crowd will be evenly split between the zealous, the curious and the skeptical, and there’s little chance they’ll win them all over. Whatever it was, it wasn’t because of a lack of effort on the band’s part – FF played a highly energetic albeit short set (one hour including encore, but understandable since they have but one album), displaying some impressive stage presence for such a young band. There was just the right amount of in-your-face confrontational attitude mixed in with their eagerness to impress. These guys are pretty good. Not life-changing, but definitely deserving of some attention. And, of course, photos here.

I was checking out the Canadian Music Week schedule for next weekend, and to my surprise there’s actually a few shows that look interesting. Friday night at the 360 is the Boompa Records showcase, featuring The Salteens, Sekiden, Girl Nobody, Kevin Kane, Natasha Thirsk, Billy & The Lost Boys and Reverie Sound Revue. Some of this bill will also be playing on Sunday afternoon at the same venue. On Saturday night at Healeys, you’ve got Endearing Records’ showcase – I went to this last year, and it was a pretty good time. This year’s lineup has The Meligrove Band, The Heavy Blinkers, Aaron Booth, Novillero and The Waking Eyes. I may do that one or the Weewerk show the same night at Sneaky Dees. Acts on tap for that one are Jon-Rae Fletcher and The River, The Barmitzvah Brothers, Great Lake Swimmers, The Two-Minute Miracles, Elliott Brood and Singing Saw Shadow Show. If you think I’m linking to each of these bands individually, you’re nuts. However, each label page has info on the band and some samples.

After side projects with The Blake Babies and Some Girls, Juliana Hatfield is finally putting out another record under her own name. The self-produced In Exile Deo is out May 18.

Rounder has track previews from the whole of Sarah Harmer’s new record.

We’ve been asked to take part in a Smiths tribute night at the ElMo March 13, but the ridiculously short lead time and the fact that our drummer is in England till the end of the month will probably force us to decline. Which is both a shame and a relief. A shame because those tribute nights are fun, but a relief because I won’t have to learn how to play “Bigmouth Strikes Again”. I have the tab and could conceivably learn the parts, but my right hand simply doesn’t move that fast. But at least its gotten me to dust off my Smiths CDs, which I haven’t played in ages.

Gotta say though, I don’t understand why everyone’s getting so hot and bothered about a new Morrissey record. Sure, he hasn’t done one in seven years, but he hasn’t made a decent one in ten (Vauxhall And I). I suppose hope springs eternal for the daffodil-wielding, but I’m one of those who thinks he really needed Marr to make interesting music and its been a slow decline since Strangeways.

np – The Smiths / The Queen Is Dead

As I mentioned to Kevin last night, Metric are one of those buzz bands that supposedly everyone is talking about, but I don’t know anyone who is (besides me). Does that make any sense? This show was a sort of homecoming for these Toronto ex-pats now relocated to Los Angeles and despite there being no advance ticket sales, a good-sized crowd did show up to welcome them back to Hogtown.

Support was awfully-monickered Boy, who played a set of pleasant, but ultimately bland and forgettable singer-songwriter acoustic pop. They struck me as the sort of band who might place well in a college coffee house competition. They’ve been getting a moderate amount of press lately and I see the CD everywhere (mostly in used stores, take that as you will), so maybe there’s something more noteworthy in what they do that I’m missing, but I don’t feel a great void in my life for not getting it.

Metric took the stage nearly a half-hour later than their scheduled start time of midnight, which you might think would result in a late late night, but when you’re only talking about a 45-minute encore-less set, it’s not really a problem. The brevity of the set was my only complaint, though to be fair, they don’t have that much material. They eschewed the slower numbers off their debut album Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? for some uptempo new numbers, keeping the show’s energy level always dimed all the way through. The whole band was positively kinetic onstage with much bounding around, but the focal point of the band was obviously frontwoman Emily Haines – despite being under the weather with a cold, she radiated confidence and sex appeal from the stage. She also photographs well.

So the set was a little short, yeah, but there can be no gripes about the quality of the performance – they left it all on stage, to borrow a sports cliche. Use of samples and loops to reproduce the song arrangements from the album were thankfully kept to a minumum, almost everything came straight from the live band, well-polished from relentless touring. My only request would be that the next time they come through town, they at least break the one-hour mark with their set.

Exclaim! ran a cover story on Metric a few months back.

Before the show, I caught Whale Rider at the Bloor. It was pretty good and made me realize I knew absolutely nothing of Maori culture – not that I think I should be expected to know anything about Maori culture. The performances were all solid if a little restrained and New Zealand won’t be losing the title of ‘most beautiful country in the world’ in my mind anytime soon. Not that I’ve ever been there.

Congratulations to Doc Halladay on his 22nd win of the season yesterday and his upcoming appointment with Cy Young. Esteban who?

I got to bed a little late last night and wanted to be up early enough today to get a little work done, but didn’t want to set my alarm. My body, god bless it, took care of that with a well-timed nosebleed at 8:45. That’ll get you out of bed.

np – Mojave 3 / Spoon and Rafter